By Pablo Daniel Magee
It all started when I followed Dr. Martin Almada to Chile, as part of my research on Operation Condor in Latin America. After the ceremony in which he was given the key to the City of Santiago for his fundamental contribution to the cause of human rights in the continent, we slipped away to a remote farmhouse, in the middle of nowhere. Enjoying a barbecue and a delicious plate of beans, Martin asked me about my research and told me about a vision he had: “I dream of going to heaven to meet General Stroessner and ask him why he did what he did”, he said. A little surprised by such an idea from a person as Cartesian as him, I did not pay much attention and was about to continue the conversation when he insisted, adding: “and Stroessner would ask me for a Coca-Cola, for sure”, and laughed.
At the time, I did not give much importance to the idea and we continued talking about the political situation in Chile and discussing the events of the last few days. However, that night, the idea kept spinning around in my head. I had been studying the Condor for several years and I was at a point where the frustration of considering all the data I was missing to start writing was torturing me more and more. Being originally from the city of Avignon, France (the city of the bridge of the famous song, but also the international capital of theater), I began to consider the concept of Martin under an artistic perspective.
It must be said that I am a member of the French College of Pataphysics society, which conceives a philosophy of science imagined by the French writer Alfred Jarry and which can be described as a system of total disintegration and reconstruction within the unusual. Thus, the idea of devoting myself to the methodical deconstruction of the Paraguayan dictatorship in order to reconstruct it within an imaginary context became very interesting to me. It seemed to me that such a context could be Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy. Obviously, Eugène Ionesco’s theater, which promotes protest through the representation of the absurd, came to spark some conceptual ideas in me: why, then, not reconstruct this dictatorship in an absurd, but perhaps… necessary, imaginary environment?
As everyone knows, after the 1989 coup and having been abandoned by the United States government, the dictator Alfredo Stroessner took refuge in Brazil, escaping in life the trial demanded by the Paraguayan justice system. He thus left the victims of the dictatorship and their families with their wounds forever open. At one time in my life, I was very close to the family of the master Alejandro Jodorowsky, architect of the concept of psychomagic, who seeks to heal concrete wounds through the confrontation of the sick person with the representation of the causes of his wounds. Through a play, he could then propose to the Paraguayan people a direct confrontation with their executioner, through the representation of his trial. But there arose another problem: a trial is supposed to be impartial. However, it is a bit easy to judge someone who is no longer here to defend himself. “And how to include the Paraguayan people in this trial? I wouldn’t… I wouldn’t dare… but yes! It’s the only solution!”, I thought, “Martin Almada will have to be forced to defend General Stroessner”.
That was how I woke up the next day with few hours of sleep, and got on the plane that took me back to Paraguay, alone. When I arrived in Sao Paulo, I had half of the script written. When I arrived here, the work was already there, roughly described in my notebook. A few days later, I presented myself at the door of Maestro Agustín Núñez’s Theater Studio to read the play to him. After listening to me attentively, he made some comments and wrote his prologue.
Today, we are days away from the premiere of the play Pundonoroso, Juicio a Stroessner at the Arlequín Theater, with the support of the Municipal Funds for Culture, and the play was declared of Cultural Interest by the National Secretariat of Culture. In addition, the radio theater version of the play won the Edda de los Ríos national award for Best Digital Theater Play. This theatrical adventure is taking off.
A couple of months ago, Martín Almada listened to the first reading of the play by the cast. I sensed all the suffering he was going through as he listened, and I even felt guilty for making him go through it. But at the end he came up to me and said, “it seems I had a lot of resentment towards Stroessner, a desire for revenge… but I chose to forgive, and in the end, it seems much healthier to me.”
Master Jodorowsky: mission accomplished!
Pundonoroso, Juicio a Stroessner
Arlequín Teatro – 4 sole performances:
Friday, November 18, 9pm.
Saturday, November 19, 6 pm and 9 pm.
Sunday, November 20, 8 pm.
Friday, December 16th, 8pm
Saturday, December 17th, 8pm
Actors: Héctor Silva, Ronald Von Knobloch, Romy Fischer, Silvio Rodas, Juan Carlos Moreno, Ariel Galeano, and Roberto Cardozo. The play is scored by Ariel Burgos.
Image Source: Dani González
* French writer, journalist, screenwriter and playwright, author of the non-fiction novel Opération Condor, Un homme face à la terreur en Amérique latine, Saint Simon, 2020, 378p. ISBN 978-2-37435-025-7